The Era of Aria Snape

42

Chapter Forty-Two

ARIA ALLOWED HARRY to lead the way, half considering turning back, although she didn't know how she would find the exit after all those rocks had blocked it. Perhaps if that giant snake saw them they wouldn't need to find the exit.

The two stopped in front of a large door, several serpent carvings lining the dark metal.

Harry approached first, speaking in that weird language again. Aria watched as the door opened, revealing yet another dark tunnel. The difference being that this made way to Chamber. Giant snakeheads lined the pathway and ahead, a large carving of who she assumed to be Salazar Slytherin embellished the wall.

Aria didn't know whether to feel impressed or scared. She was a Slytherin, she had to admire the details, all while shivering and feeling nauseous at the sight of a small girl's body not far from where she and Harry stood.

"Is she..." Aria trailed off, not wanting to voice her concerns.

Harry called for her, beginning to run across the slippery pathway. As much as Aria wanted to rush to the girl's side, she stayed back, taking cautious steps along the stoned walkway, wand out as she kept one eye on Harry and the other aware of any possible movement she detected.

Aria reached Harry's side, wincing as he begged Ginny to wake up. Her skin was even lighter than usual, her orange hair soaked from the water she lay in.

"She won't wake."

Aria jumped at the unfamiliar voice and pointed her wand toward the source-a young man, tall and handsome. He wore Slytherin robes yet she had never seen him before.

"Tom. Tom Riddle." Harry said from his crouched position beside Ginny.

"How do you know him, Harry?" Aria whispered, but he didn't reply.

"What do you mean she won't wake? She's not...?"

"She's still alive, but only just."

His voice, so soft, so calm, but with a dangerous, threatening edge to it. Aria did not like it one bit.

He moved closer as Harry asked if he were a ghost. The last thing they needed was another obnoxious ghost, no matter how attractive. He paid no heed to Aria, barely looking in her direction as her wand still pointed to his neck.

"A memory." He said to Harry. "Preserved in a diary for fifty years."

Aria wished she knew what was going on. Was he the heir of Slytherin? Some ancient boy who lived in a book?

"She's cold as ice. Ginny, please don't be dead. Wake up." Harry muttered, staring down at the girl. Aria hid her concern for the young girl, her eyes not able to move from the boy who now stood dangerously close to them.

For an instant, she looked towards the unconscious girl, taking her eyes off of Tom. Ginny seemed to be breathing, only barely, though. George would not be happy, she didn't like the thought of him losing his sister. Aria looked back at the strange boy and glared.

"You've got to help us, Tom. There's a basilisk." Harry pleaded.

"It won't come until it's called."

Aria's mind raced, what did he mean by that? He spoke of it as if it were his... pet.

"Give me my wand, Tom." Harry stood up, reaching for the wand in his hand.

Aria hadn't noticed that Tom had taken Harry's wand. She feared now, more than ever, that she and Potter may meet the same fate as Ginny Weasley if they stayed in the Chamber for much longer.

"You won't be needing it." He said.

"Oh, I think he will. Give it back to him." Aria demanded but found that she could not move as Tom looked towards her, taking her in, a small smirk lining his face before his attention once again returned to Harry.

Harry shook his head, "Listen, we've got to go. We've got to save her."

"I'm afraid I can't do that. You see, as poor Ginny grows weaker, I grow stronger. Yes, Harry, it was Ginny Weasley who opened the Chamber of Secrets."

Aria could not even voice her thoughts, her words all trapped in her throat and her arms frozen by her side.

"No. She couldn't, she wouldn't."

"It was Ginny who set the basilisk on the Mudbloods and Filch's cat. Ginny who wrote the threatening messages on the walls."

"But why?"

"Because I told her to." He smiled. "You'll find I can be very persuasive." Tom looked towards Aria. "Not that she knew what she was doing. She was, shall we say, in a kind of trance. Still, the power of the diary began to scare her. She tried to dispose of it in the girls' bathroom, and then, who should find it but you. The very person I was most anxious to meet." He looked to Aria again. "Of course, you are a bonus, one I tried to collect many, many times."

Aria said nothing, she couldn't.

He smiled as Harry spoke again. "And why did you want to meet me?"

"I knew I had to talk to you, meet you if I could. So I decided to show you my capture of that brainless oaf Hagrid to gain your trust."

"Hagrid's my friend! And you framed him, didn't you?"

"It was my word against Hagrid's. Only Dumbledore seemed to think he was innocent."

"I bet Dumbledore saw right through you."

Aria began to put the pieces together, "Harry!" She was able to call his name, wanting to warn him that Tom was bad news, but she found her throat closing up, tighter, tighter. She reached for it, coughing and spluttering, but even as she breathed in the air, she felt no relief.

"He certainly kept an annoyingly close watch on me after that." Tom snapped. "I knew it wouldn't be safe to open the Chamber again while I was still at school so I decided to leave behind a diary, preserving my sixteen-year-old self in its pages so that one day I would be able to lead another to finish Salazar Slytherin's noble work."

Well, Aria thought, at least she knew who the heir was now. And if she ever did manage to leave the Chamber alive she at least wouldn't be suspected anymore. But breathing still came difficultly to her, she feared she wouldn't live to see the day where she finally escaped.

"Well, you haven't finished it this time," Harry said. "In a few hours, the Mandrake Draught will be ready and everyone who was Petrified will be all right again."

"Haven't I told you?" Tom shook his head in disgust. "Killing Mudbloods doesn't matter to me anymore. For many months now, my new target has been you." Harry stepped back at his words. "How is it that a baby who no extraordinary magical talent was able to defeat the greatest wizard of all time? How did you escape with nothing but a scar while Lord Voldemort's powers were destroyed?"

"Why do you care how I escaped? Voldemort was after your time."

At the mention of the Dark Lord, Aria's throat closed again, slowly this time as if someone were strangling her. Too slow to completely cut off her air, but too fast for her to catch her breath. She struggled, but Harry didn't seem to notice.

"Voldemort is my past, present, and future."

At those words, Aria managed to call softly for Harry's name before she felt her body go numb and hit the floor, slipping into the body of water beside the pathway. She had no strength to resist. The water was so dark, so cold that the surface seemed like a distant dream rather than something she could reach. All her will to fight for her life left her body as she sunk deeper and deeper into the Chamber, the darkness engulfing her.